Growing up my parents would joke that my great grandma hid
money between the plates in her china cabinet. While this might sound strange,
I would have to bet that many of you have heard similar stories from the elders
in your family. As odd as this may sound I’m sure we can all agree that after
going through the Great Depression, our grandparents had a pretty good reason
for this strange behavior.

As the generation who will best remember our country’s
recent recession, how does this economic dive effect the way we handle our
money? A recent study by the Associated
Press indicates that Americans lost an average of one-third the value of their
assets during the lowest part of the recession. Since then over half have stated
that they no longer worry about their finances.
The same number of Americans, say they now feel more prepared for
retirement and there has been a forty-two percent increase in retirement
account contributions. Just about half of the population has built some kind of
emergency fund and seventy-eight percent of people now feel they are better
prepared for their future after the recession.

Now this survey was done on adults over the age of 25, but
how do you think Generation-Y will be affected by the recession. Will we have as much credit card debit as our
parents? Will we rely less on social security? Will we start saving for our
children’s college educations way earlier in the game? No matter how the
recession may have affected us, we all have a unique opportunity to learn from
this recent financial crisis. We can all pass this knowledge on so someday our
grandkids can make fun of US for doing something as ridiculous as hiding cash
between our own fine china.